“I never met Putin,” Trump said at a July 2016 news conference. “I don’t
know who Putin is. He said one nice thing about me. He said I'm a
genius. I said thank you very much to the newspaper and that was the end
of it. I never met Putin.”
“Then Putin said, ’Donald Trump is a genius, he’s going to be the next
great leader of the United States.’ No, no, think of it. They wanted me
to disavow what he said. How dare you call me a genius. How dare you
call me a genius, Vladimir. Wouldn’t it be nice if we actually got along
with Russia? Wouldn’t that be good?"
“Putin said good things about me. He said, ‘he’s a leader and there’s no
question about it, he’s a genius.’ So they all said, the media, they
said -- you saw it on the debate -- they said, ‘you admire President
Putin.’ I said, I don’t admire him. I said he was a strong leader, which
he is. I mean, he might be bad, he might be good. But he’s a strong leader.”
"I have no relationship with him other than he called me a genius,”
Trump said. “He said, ‘Donald Trump is a genius and he is going to be
the leader of the party and he's going to be the leader of the world or
something.’”
Trump tells David Letterman that he’s done “a lot of business with the
Russians” and says they are “smart” and “tough” and that they don’t look
“so dumb right now.” He calls Putin a “tough guy” and says that he “met
him once.”
Trump says he has a relationship with Vladimir Putin:
“I do have a relationship and I can tell you that he’s very interested
in what we’re doing here today,” he said on MSNBC of the Miss Universe
pageant. “He’s probably very interested in what you and I are saying
today, and I’m sure he’s going to be seeing it in some form, but I do
have a relationship with him and I think it’s very interesting to see
what’s happened.”
“I was in Moscow and I was in Russia and they treated me so
fantastically. I met so many incredible people.”
“When I went to Russia with the Miss Universe pageant, (Putin) contacted
me and was so nice. I mean, the Russian people were so fantastic to us,”
he said on “Fox and Friends.” “I’ll just say this, they are doing –
they’re outsmarting us at many turns, as we all understand.
Trump tells a crowd at CPAC that Putin sent him a present during Miss
Universe with a note and he “spoke to all of his people.”
Trump tells Fox Business’ Eric Bolling that Putin was nice to him during
Miss Universe.
“We just left Moscow,” Trump said. “He could not have been nicer. He was
so nice and so everything. But you have to give him credit that what
he’s doing for that country in terms of their world prestige is very
strong.”
”I own Miss Universe, I was in Russia, I was in Moscow recently and I
spoke, indirectly and directly, with President Putin, who could not have
been nicer, and we had a tremendous success.”
Trump tells Jeffrey Lord of the American Spectator that Putin treated
him “unbelievably well” during Miss Universe and cites Putin to say the
term “American exceptionalism” is a “dangerous term.”
Trump also said he received “a gift from Putin – an award and a
beautiful letter.” He does not confirm or deny meeting with Putin when
asked.
“I had the Miss Universe over there two years ago,” Trump tells the City
Club of Chicago. “I got to know these guys well. We can get along with
them well. We can get along with them well.”
“I think I’d get along well with Putin. I know many of the people. I had
a major event there two years ago in Moscow, as you know. It was a
tremendous success. An amazing success. I think I’d get along well with
Putin.”
Trump tells reporters at Trump Tower that “Putin is a nicer person than
I am.”
Trump says Putin has been “very nice” to him:
"I'm saying that I'd possibly have a good relationship. He's been very
nice to me,"
Asked if he’s ever spoken to Vladimir Putin, Trump gives a “no comment”
to Fox News’ Bret Baier.
“Yeah, I have no comment on that,” he said. “No comment.”
Trump tells a local Miami CBS affiliate that he has nothing to do with
Russia and has never met Putin, saying, “But I have nothing to do with
Russia, nothing to do, I never met Putin, I have nothing to do with
Russia whatsoever.”
Trump tells ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that if he were to be elected
president, Putin is “not going into Ukraine.”
“He's not going into Ukraine, OK, just so you understand,” Trump said.
“He's not going to go into Ukraine, all right? You can mark it down. You
can put it down. You can take it anywhere you want.”
Asked about Putin’s previous invasion of Crimea, Trump said, "OK --
well, he's there in a certain way. But I'm not there.
Trump said of Putin at a rally, “I don’t love, I don’t hate.”
“I don’t love, I don’t hate,” he said in Nevada. “We’ll see how it
works. We’ll see. Maybe we’ll have a good relationship. Maybe we’ll have
a horrible relationship. Maybe we’ll have a relationship right in the
middle.”
Trump said at presidential debate: “I don’t know Putin. I think it would
be great if we got along with Russia because we could fight ISIS
together, as an example. But I don’t know Putin.”
And I can tell you, speaking for myself, I own nothing in Russia. I have
no loans in Russia. I don't have any deals in Russia. President Putin
called me up very nicely to congratulate me on the win of the election,”
Trump said.
Trump tells David Letterman that he’s done “a lot of business with the
Russians” and says they are “smart” and “tough” and that they don’t look
“so dumb right now.” He calls Putin a “tough guy” and says that he “met
him once.”
http://www.cnn.com/interactive/2017/03/politics/trump-putin-russia-timeline/
“I was in Moscow and I was in Russia and they treated me so
fantastically. I met so many incredible people.”